


A Tale for a Costume

by ShadowCrusade



Series: All Hallows Karma [9]
Category: RWBY
Genre: All Hallows Karma, Fair Game October Month 2020, M/M, Mutual Pining, Pre-Relationship, and more vale lore, buckle in boys we got some info dump, no beta im about as dead as the zombies i reference in this story when it comes to grammar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-11
Updated: 2020-10-11
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:07:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,021
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26941891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShadowCrusade/pseuds/ShadowCrusade
Summary: Day 9: CostumesClover can't think of what to be for Halloween. His friends all have their ideas, but he's drawing up a blank. Maybe, some old legends told by a journalist will spark some inspiration.
Relationships: Qrow Branwen/Clover Ebi
Series: All Hallows Karma [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1950640
Comments: 9
Kudos: 32





	A Tale for a Costume

**Author's Note:**

> Lets goooooooooooooooooooooooo

Halloween was one of the holidays that Clover didn’t really remember celebrating all that much. Sure, when he was a kid him and his cousins would get together and go trick-r-treating. He remembered the matched costumes and the late nights from the candy that they ate. As time went on though, Halloween just became another day on the calendar. He hadn’t seriously dressed up for the one day holiday since he was a kid. 

Which led to the current predicament.

“You could always go as like a pirate.” Elm suggested. “You have the chest for it.” 

“And the thighs.” Harriet chimed in. 

“You don’t have any cool scars though.” Marrow pointed out as he flipped a page in the magazine that he had in hand. “Plus, I don’t think you’d be a very good pirate.”

“Why not?” Clover asked. Sure, the idea of piracy didn’t sit all that well with him, but what was wrong with him dressing up as one.

“How can I put this nicely?” Marrow gave an unsure smile as he tried to find his next words.

“You’re too much of a fucking cop.” Harriet said bluntly as she played a game on her phone. 

“Hare, I said nicely.”

“That was nice.”

“Well, if not a pirate then what the heck am I going as? Do I really have to grab one?” He asked. The group of friends were currently seated in the apartment that Clover had currently rented out. 

It was almost like clockwork when they had entered his abode. Elm had been the first one to enter his apartment, without breaking in this time. She brought nothing, but her usual energy and enthusiasm. At least, Clover was wide awake to not be caught off guard by the tall woman. Vine had followed next, about half an hour later. With some tea bags and a gentle morning greeting. It was the three of them for about an hour until the screams and shouts from Marrow and Harriet reached them from outside the door. Another competition to his door it seems and neither of them wanted to admit who the loser was. It had been a couple of hours since all five of them gathered at Clover’s place. Different topics of conversation were made and soon they began to talk about the Halloween celebrations. 

Which is what led to the current matter at hand. 

“Of course you have to dress up Clover!” Elm stomped her foot down. “This is Halloween! And you’re on vacation! You can’t just not dress up!”

“What if the five of us went as like a group costume?” Vine asked. 

“Did you have something in mind Vine?” Marrow asked, his attention piqued with interest. 

“We could always dress up as some of the local fables that this continent may have.” Vine suggested. “It would be new to us since none of us are from here, and it might be fun to do it all together.” 

“That could work.” Harriet agreed. “I guess we could hit up the locals to see what there is.”

“Can we do that after lunch, I don’t know about you guys, but I’m starving.” Marrow stated as his stomach growled. They all laughed. 

“Sounds like a plan.”

\--

“I never thought I would say this, but you are not having the best luck today my friend.” Elm said as she patted her friend on the shoulder. 

“Tell me about it.” Clover groaned out. While finding the local tales that suited the rest of his friends was easy enough, Clover was an entirely different matter. “I can’t believe there isn’t really any new lore when it comes to luck.”

“Maybe, because we know all the iterations since most of the stories we do know, spawned in Solitas.” Vine pointed out. “If we can’t find anything, you could always dress up as a leprechaun.”

“No way.” Clover rejected the idea. “I did that once when I was a kid and that was the worst thing I’ve ever come up with.” He shivered at the memory of when he had dressed up as the lucky creature. Never again would he go through the pain of the tight pants he had to wear that day. It made everything uncomfortable. 

“You could always dress up as one giant horseshoe.” Marrow suggested. “Or a wishbone.” Marrow had found a dog costume with a fake steak to resemble an old story about a dog and it’s reflection. The young man always said he was more of a dog person anyways, so he immediately took that as an inspiration for his costume. 

“I’ll pass.” Clover told the younger man as his young friend shrugged. “Besides, if I dress up as a wishbone, then you’d have to be _hounding_ me all night.” The collective groan he received from his friends made it worth it. “We should probably keep looking around for at least your costumes.” He stated. “Maybe, I’ll find something that I like.” 

The group continued on their way through the costume shop. Harriet had an easy enough time finding a costume for her. A simple bunny costume would suffice for the tale she chose. Although, Marrow had laughed at her since he said she looked more like the Easter Bunny as opposed to a Hare. Vine had silently disappeared from the group and came back with a costume labeled ‘Druid’. It had fake vines and leaves that accompanied the costume. With the group doing their shopping early enough in the month, they more or less had their pick in their costumes. 

Elm’s choice was a bit more complicated.

“You wanna be a literal Elm?” Marrow asked.

“Yes! How can I live up to my name and my fable if I don’t do it justice?” Elm asked as she seemed dead set on her decision. “I must become one with tree kind!” The group set off in various directions of the store in the attempt to find Elm the costume that she desired. Clover was able to find some accessories that could be used. He grabbed those as he kept searching around the store. 

He was walking around the corner of an aisle when he bumped into someone. A small squeak was all the warning he had before he looked down and found a familiar gradient colored head on the floor. 

“Ruby?”

Silver eyes met teal. “Oh! Clover!” The girl immediately shot straight up. “I didn’t see you! Sorry!”

He shook his head. “No, it’s okay. Really I should be apologizing to you. I should have been more mindful about where I was walking.”

“It’s okay!” She reassured as she smiled. “So, are you doing some costume shopping too?” She asked. 

“Yeah, Elm wants to be a tree. So, we’re trying to find tree stuff.” 

“Has she tried being a small groot?” 

“I... hadn’t thought about that.” He told her. He remembered watching the movie with that character with Elm. How did the thought not cross his mind? “I’m sure she’ll figure it out...eventually.”

The small girl could only laugh. “What about you? What are you planning to be?”

Clover shrugged. “No clue.” Ruby blinked at him, waiting for an explanation. “We went around and started to ask the locals about some local legends to see if we could do a group fable dress up. Alas, there weren’t exactly any about luck or that really stuck out to me so...” He trailed off. 

Ruby clapped her hands together. “I got it! Why don’t you go as the KingFisher?” 

“The bird?”

Ruby nodded. “Yeah, there’s an old story regarding Kingfishers over in Patch. It dates back to the times of the Hallows.”

“I don’t think I’ve heard that story.” 

“It’s a really old tale, Uncle Qrow used to tell it to me and Yang when we were little. I don’t remember all the details, so you’d have to ask him.” Ruby suggested. “He’s not busy at the moment, so you can ask him right now.” 

“Oh, I’m sure he-”

“Uncle Qrow! I need help!” Ruby shouted into the aisles of the store. Clover thought about running away right then and there if it wasn’t for a familiar grumble from the next aisle over. 

“Rubes, you can’t just scream like that you’re gonna get us in-” Qrow paused as he came around the corner and took notice of Clover. “...trouble.” He finished. “Hey...”

“Hi.” 

“Okay, so I didn’t actually need help.” Ruby admitted. “Clover needs help for a costume idea and he brought up fables and legends and I thought you could tell him the Kingfisher story.” 

“If you’re not too busy...” Qrow offered. 

“Elm can find her own costume.” Clover was quick to take Qrow up on the deal. 

“I can help her find one!” Ruby volunteered and before either man could say anything, the young girl quickly darted off into the aisles. 

“Or she can do that.” Clover said as he smiled at the girls antics. 

“Oh Ruby. She’s more like her mom everyday.” Qrow rolled his eyes at the thought. “She jumps from one subject to the next.”

“She’s a good kid.” Clover stated, as he stared off in the direction from where she disappeared. “Even if she blurts out things that lead to confusion.” Qrow coughed loudly, as if he didn’t hear Clover’s words. “Marriage, huh?” 

“Oh my gods, please never speak of that again.” Clover could only laugh as he followed Qrow outside the store. “I can’t believe she actually said that.” 

“I thought it was funny.”

“I know you did. You and Mercury laughed for twenty minutes.” 

Clover chuckled a bit at the memory. “It was very funny.” Qrow groaned in annoyance. 

Since the store they were at was at the mall, the food court was right in front of the store. Clover didn’t want to go far from the store as technically, he was still shopping with his friends. Although, with how picky Elm could be, it would no doubt be awhile before she left the store with anything before the store closed for the night. The two men opted to share a pizza between the two of them while Clover waited patiently for Qrow to begin his tale. 

“Okay so, you do know something about the Hallows right?” Qrow asked. 

Clover thought about it for a second. “Was that during a weird plague or something here in Sanus.”

Qrow nodded. “Yeah, something like that. So, if you go to the old graveyards closer to the ruins of the old palace, you’ll notice something weird about the graves.” Clover sat up a little straighter. “They have iron cages on top of the grave with spikes pointing downward towards the coffin.” 

“I think I’ve seen a few like that.” Clover stated. When he and the others had gone to explore the town, he noticed some graves were like that.

“The Hallows was a time period in Sanus in which old stories say that people rose from the dead.” 

“No way.”

Qrow nodded. “Yup. It was a dark time in Sanus. A plague had descended upon the continent that kept the Kingdom of Vale in isolation. Legends say that it was the spirits of the people that had already died. They were jealous and spiteful of the fact that the living did nothing to honor the past or the people that lived through it, so it was a curse.”

“Okay wow. That’s rude.”

Qrow shrugged. “People from Vale tried to run to Vacuo or even Anima for a cure, but they wouldn’t make it. The curse prevented anyone from leaving Vale alive. The stories say that once a person started to show symptoms of the sickness, they would die within six days. And thirteen days after they died and their body was still around, it would awaken from it’s grave to bring terror to those still living.”

“This is a terrible story!” Clover exclaimed as Qrow smirked. “Does it get better?” Qrow nodded. “I’m gonna hold you to that.” 

“So, the citizens of the mainland were being wiped out. Like, boom. Dwindling population.” Qrow took a bite out of his pizza. “There was no hope of escape and no way to preserve life. During this time, people were afraid of having children, so it really seemed like they would be the last generation in this plague.”

Clover could only imagine the amount of turmoil back then. He only vaguely remembered being taught about the subject in his early education. However, since he was from Argus, he didn't do much else on the research regarding it since he wasn’t from Vale. 

“Then, a young girl noticed something odd.” Qrow continued. “Whenever she visited the foggy shores of Vale, she would notice a bird that always flew around the area. It would never land on the mainland, it would simply fly around before it would retreat into the fog. She never followed, but she quickly realised that it was the same bird everytime. One day, she gathered the remaining citizens that hadn’t completely lost hope and asked them to trust her to lead them to salvation. They trusted her and they built boats out whatever they could. They pulled those boats to shore and they waited. Soon, not one but many birds appeared to the people. They all perched on the boats themselves, unafraid of the humans that surrounded them. With blind faith, they sailed into the waters, with the birds as their guides into the heavy fog.”

“So, then what happened?” Clover asked, his pizza forgotten. 

“The people sailed through the fog and when there would be waves that threatened to sink them, a bird would simply fly over and the ocean would settle once more. Soon, after hours of paddling with the help of the birds and the currents, they arrived on an island. The remaining citizens made their home here on the island where the birds watched over them, protecting them.” Qrow took a sip from his drink that he ordered. 

“Then one day, the fog started to disappear. Little by little, the fog faded until the mainland could be seen. When that happened, the sun shone over the sea for the time in years and the beauty of the life that thrived beneath the waves impressed everyone. The young girl that saved as many as she could was an adult now, with a family of her own. The citizens of the island gathered by the shores once more to thank the birds for saving them. When that happened, the birds all left the island, and it almost seemed like the waves of the sea followed them. They left the island and went to the mainland and beyond. From that day on, the citizens have honored their ancestors on All Halllow's Eve to appease the past and to respect them.” 

“Oh wow.” 

“It’s said that the bird was born from the ocean and was a strong indicator of prosperity, love, and most of all blessed luck. Because of that, the bird was named the Kingfisher, to honor both its meaning to the people and what they believed its origin to be.” Qrow finished. “It’s a sacred bird in Patch, even though they are rare to see in Vale. Especially since it seems they all migrated to Argus and Anima in general.”

“Maybe they think that Argus needs some extra protecting.” Clover stated as Qrow chuckled.

“With all the shady shit that goes on in Mistral, I wouldn’t be surprised if the birds were trying to prevent another Great War.” 

“Qrow...I really enjoyed hearing that story.” Clover thanked. “I can’t believe no one knew that story.”

“You’re asking the wrong people.” Qrow said simply. “If you had asked anyone on Patch the story, they would have been able to tell you. It’s a story that’s been passed down. It’s almost as cool as hearing it from the family of the girl that saved the citizens.”

“Wait...she’s real?”

“Was.” Qrow corrected. “This was a couple of centuries ago, Clover. She’s definitely dead now.” 

“Oh right.” Clover felt stupid for asking. “So, what happened to the family? Are they still around?” 

Qrow nodded. “Yup. There’s currently one descendant left in the family now, but I like to think that everyone in that family is a stubborn brat when it comes to prevailing.” 

“Sounds like you know the last descendants pretty well.” 

“I’d sure hope so. Considering that it’s Ruby.” Clover almost fell out of his seat. “There was record of a Sophia Rose that led the charge to leave the mainland to the island of Patch. The Rose family never really left the island of Patch, at least not for long. They all came back to the island sooner or later.” Qrow told him as Clover processed that information. “Ruby is the last of the Rose family.” 

“That’s incredible. I can’t believe Ruby doesn’t know the story.” Qrow shot him a confused look. “Earlier, Ruby said that she didn’t know the story that well, which is why she yelled for you.” 

Qrow looked at him before a look of disbelief crossed his face. “That brat...” 

Before Clover could ask what he meant, a familiar voice called out to the two men. “Uncle Qrow! Clover!” Ruby waved at them as Clover could see his own friends with their shopping bags as they approached. “We managed to find Elm a costume that suits her. So, I guess the mission was accomplished.” She held a thumbs up. “Did Uncle Qrow tell you the story?”

“He did.” Clover informed her. “And...I think I know what I’m gonna be for Halloween.” 

Ruby’s eyes lit up. “Perfect! I can’t wait to see the costume!” Ruby enthused. 

Qrow shook his head. “We should probably get you home to get started on yours kid.” Ruby practically vibrated with excitement. “We’ll see you guys around.” Qrow took his leave with his niece as Elm immediately took his seat and stared directly at Clover. A gleam in her eyes. 

“So, you’ve got a costume idea?”

“Yeah?”

“....Is that a Qrow Branwen bedroom exclusive or do we get to see too?”

Clover died a little. 


End file.
